You have been working to earn your frequent flyer miles. You have spent a good amount of time earning them too. The fact is, though, there are times when you can lose those miles and find yourself without any rewards whatsoever. Frequent flyer programs are generally offered by most airlines. Without a doubt, these companies offer these programs because they provide a strong loyalty factor to the company. Will you choose an airline ticket that is for a company that is offering about the same price but without the incentive of earning free miles? But, what about losing those miles?
Expiration
It is true that some airlines offer expiration dates on their frequent flyer miles. Of course, this is key to those airlines that are looking to offer a reward such as frequent flyer miles but persons not have to pay out on that rewards. The fact is though that most people that earn frequent flyer miles never do redeem them (a fact that plays a big role in other reasons for losing airline miles below!) Nevertheless, most airlines do place expiration dates on their miles. To learn if your frequent flyer miles have an expiration date, take the time to read the fine print of your program. This is clearly noted.
Going Out Of Business
In this day and age, we hear a good deal about airlines going bankrupt. Unfortunately, many airlines had to face this fact about the September 11th attacks. If you were a frequent flyer program earner at this point, you may have thought that perhaps you would be losing your frequent flyer miles since the company you are working with just up and left you. Although airlines have placed clauses in their frequent flyer programs that allow them to stop honoring frequent flyer miles at any time even if they just feel like it, most do not. If your airline has gone bankrupt, chances are that another company will be taking over. Usually, your frequent flyer miles are still honored there. If the company has to liquidate, though, this does mean a loss of frequent flyer miles across the board for that company.
The fact is that frequent flyer miles are something that airlines offer to keep loyalty to that airline up. They rarely stop honoring frequent flyer miles. As we said earlier, most people that earn them do not even use them so there is a fairly low amount of liability tied to these programs.